The Great Escape
by JuhJurkovick
Summary: The Mercers show a girl that it's alright to stand up for herself, to fight for what she loves and to get rid of what she hates.
1. Dragon's Baby

_Just another damn day in the life_. Erika thought as she got up from her comfy bed and headed to her bathroom. She looked herself on the mirror and just like everyone who just woke up, her porcelain white face had red stripes from the sheets , her long light brown hair was a mess and her eyes kinda red. She had Heterochromia, that means her eyes were two different colors: the right one green and the left one, hazel. Something peculiar and rare, and she loved it, well, except when people kept staring at her to see if they got it right.

Since last year she had been living back in Detroit. But it wasn't always like this… She was actually born in Vancouver, Canada and lived there the first three years of her life. Then, her dad was transferred by the company he worked for to Massachusetts, the three of them: Erika, her mom Helen, and her dad Chris, lived there until when she turned seven.

That was when they moved to Detroit. She liked the different places, she usually made friends with easy and loved to play with them. In Detroit she had good neighbors, couldn't really remember their names now, but she remembered that they took good care of her when none of her parents were at home. It was a pity it only lasted for one year, the next one, they were moving to Chicago.

They stayed there for long, until when Erika turned fourteen. Weeks later, her father announced that he'd have to move back to Canada, and that's when her mother had enough. It wasn't pleasant at all to be carried like a piece of luggage now and there, but what mattered to Erika, was that they were all together. And that matter was broken when her mom asked for the divorce, she didn't want to move again and her dad couldn't stay.

The last thing Erika wanted was to go through court, and that was exactly what happened. Her father tried to take it on easy, to hurt her the least possible, but not her mom, she wanted Erika to stay with her by any coast. They were still fighting over her when her dad surrendered and gave the custody to Helen. After a long talk with him, Erika understood his real reason: this wouldn't be over anytime soon, and it'd only become more painful as the time went by. Since both were successful Architects, the probability of Erika end up with her mom anyway was really high, like always in those kind of cases. He made it clear to her: he loved her more than anything and couldn't stand seeing her suffer like she was. Erika never doubted a word, when she called or emailed him, her dad was always there for her. He never gave up on her.

Her life with her mother wasn't bad at all. They loved each other, and Helen always tried her hardest to give Erika the best stuff around, but that doesn't mean she's spoiled. You'd guess that someone with that bank account would only wear expensive brands, but she didn't care about it, she was happy with Gap and H&M. Most of the money her mom gave to her and her dad sent to her, she saved on her own bank account. They weren't millionaires or such, but let's just say that money wasn't between their worries.

"Erikan, time to get up!" Her step father called from the other side of the door.

She sighed, his voice annoyed the shit out of her "I'm already up!" She answered with no sympathy. She didn't like him and as if everything wasn't enough, she hated the damn nickname he had given her.

The time she tried to tell him to knock it off, her mother said it was "sweet" and that he should keep it, that was enough to Dracon, or Dragon like she secretly called him, to keep it going. The man was a damn false, he seemed to really love her mother and all, but that 'all' didn't include Erika. At first, it was all a bed of roses, after they married, hell started, and that was exactly one year ago.

Bringing them back to Detroit seemed the only thing he had done right. Erika tried to convince her mom to move back to the house where they lived so long ago, but Dracon refused, it was too "cheap". Now they lived in a rich ass apartment, in the finest area of Detroit. He was a rich bastard, his father owned a big computer company, of which he was the head manager. And that gave him the thought that he was better than everyone, but the reality is that he was a dumb ass. Sure, he always provided them with the latest computers and really understood of that area, but if you asked him what was going on the country, he was more likely to say "which country? Oh, ours?"

"Hello sweetie" Helen greeted from the dinning room, as Erika walked straight to the kitchen, already wearing her school uniform.

"Hi mom" After taking her favorite mug from the cabinet, she sat on the chair, with them. The maid, Loren, never put her favorite mug on the table under Dracon's orders.

"Erikan, why do you insist on drinking on this mug?"

"'Cause I like it"

"Because" He corrected her and she rolled her eyes, just like a 17 year-old girl would do. "Don't roll your eyes at me, that's very impolite"

"Is breathing also impolite?" She asked with a fake smile and acid voice.

"Excuse me?"

"Erika!" Her mom censored before dropping the subject "So, what are you going to do today?"

"Same old mom, school then back home… That's what I'm gonna do" She said quickly before start drinking her coffee and eating a toast with butter all over it.

"Aren't you going to ask what I'm going to do?" Helen asked with a small smile. Erika shook her head 'no'.

There wasn't really a point to be sweet with her mother anymore, she wasn't the same anymore and yes, all Dracon's fault. _All Dragon's fucking fault! _She was always on his side, even when it was obvious that he was wrong. But he made her happy, she couldn't exactly figure out how, but he did anyway, and despite it all, the last thing she wanted was to see her mother sad, that's why she never really made a strong attempt to fight against him.

"Well, I'm going to tell you anyway"

Erika shrugged "Suit yourself" She said with her mouth full of chewed toast. Her mom looked at her in disapproval, that made her to smile inside.

Helen smiled at Dracon, who smiled back "Today we have a doctor appointment"

She wasn't interested at all, but felt inclined to ask "Why's that?"

"I'm three months pregnant" Her mom was really thin, not in the anorexic way, and the belly had just started to show off.

"WHAT?!" She swallowed the food all at once and ended up coughing at bit. After recomposing herself, he looked shocked to her mother, who had a big smile on her face. And the demon was laughing

"I told you she'd be shockingly happy"

Erika looked at him with a brow raised. She didn't care about having a brother or a sister, maybe that'd be good, but not a baby from that monster, that could be anything but actually good news.

"Aren't you happy sweetie?" Her mom asked while touching her arm.

Erika soon took it off "Extremely" She answered without any sign of a smile "I'm late" She got up of the table, when she was already by the hall, she heard Dragon saying

"You didn't ask to be excused!"

_Fuck you! _A sudden wish to give him the finger and punch his face took over her, but the wish of never seeing his face again was stronger. After brushing her teeth, she took her stuff and rushed out of the door. The only person who said goodbye was Loren, and Erika could only manage a weak smile before shutting the front door.

Since they moved, Loren had been working with them. She was about her 30's, with crystal blue eyes and curly red-ish brown hair. Lately, she was more of a mother to Erika than her own.

The elevator seemed to take more than usual to get to the last floor and when it finally did, she raced to the first garage, where her dark green racing Jeep was parked. It was a gif from her father when she turned sixteen, she loved it more than anything. Dracon wanted to give her an Audi, which she refused fiercely. She didn't want to show of, the car had nothing to do with her style, plus, she didn't want anything from him anyway.

She drove to the school while guitar solos blasted from the speakers. As she finally parked the car, she gave a heavy sigh and took a deep breath. She never was much of a model student, nor was the kind who only skips classes, she was mostly just a bit above the average grades, it was good enough for her. She surely considered skipping today though, but her mother probably had already called the head master, the last thing she wanted, was problems at school.

Erika took her purple and black shoulder bag from the passenger's seat and locked the doors, not that she thought anyone would like to steal her car with a parking lot full of Mercedes, BMWs and security guards, but she just wanted to make sure. The Chermical High School's entrance was full of teenagers doing the same as she, preparing themselves for another day full of useless stuff.

"Hey Ka!" Her friend Alexis greeted whit a smile while she made her way to Erika.

"Yeah, hi" Erika answered with no attempt to force a smile.

"Ok, spill it out"

"Not now Alex. Let's just get inside"

"Did something happen?" Alexis insisted and Erika sighed.

"You're not gonna stop asking 'til I tell you, will ya?"

"Nope! Learned that from you"

"Yeah, remember me to kill myself later!" Alexis chuckled "Oh no, maybe I should do it now?"

"You and your trash! Come on, what's wrong?"

"My mom's pregnant"

Alexis' eyes grew "Is it Dracon's?"

"No! It's the neighbor's!" She answered with dark acid humor

"Shit! What now?"

"Good question! What now? Maybe this will be good and Dragon will stop breathing down my neck!"

"I hope so! Damn, I'm so sorry"

"Yeah, me too. Though it's gonna be interesting… Do you think my mom has an egg inside of her?"

Alexis laughed out loud and Erika joined her as they walked in and mixed themselves with the teen mass.

"Hey Ma!"

"Oh, good morning Bobby! Where were you?"

"Just went for a walk! Is Fairy up?"

"Son, I already asked you to stop calling him like that"

Bobby laughed "Sorry Ma. Is Jackie up?"

"Not yet, why?"

"I ran into that friend of his, Dan I guess or somethin'. Anyway, he asked me to give him this" Bobby said while showing Evelyn a brown envelop with a small smile.

"You didn't open it already, did you Bobby Mercer?"

Bobby laughed and started walking upstairs "Of course not!" He wouldn't be able to convince a fly with that.

Two hours later Jack woke up and headed upstairs, the house was empty as he expected. After putting himself a full bowl of cereal with milk, he landed on the couch and turned the tv on. During the commercial, his eyes landed on a small envelope on the coffee table, right in front of him. He looked around, like if checking if someone was looking at him while he'd take a sneak peak, he didn't need it, but as they say, old habits die hard.


	2. If they suck, I'll give you my poster

**Reviews, anyone? Come on, what you think about it?!**

"God, shoot me now! I never though maths could be THAT bad!" Alexis cried as they headed to the lockers to get their stuff and leave school for the weekend.

"I did!" Erika answered with a small smile.

"Wanna come over to my house?"

"Yeah, sounds better than going home and wait for the monster to arrive"

"You know you'll have to face them again and it's gonna happen soon, right?"

Erika laughed "I know what you're thinking! No, I don't plan to run away… at least not now"

"Good. Let me know when you're about to and I'll follow you"

"Bullshit" They laughed as each headed to their cars and then to Alexis' house.

Alexis lived not too far from Erika's house. They had become friends since day one, probably because in a general look, they were the only ones at school who didn't care about showing off their latest cell phone. She lived only with her mother, Kristi, her dad passed away ten years ago from cancer. Kristi worked as publicist for a clothing store and never were interested in getting married again.

"Ka! So good to see you here!" Kristi greeted

"Hi Kris! You too. I hope it really isn't a problem"

"Oh, of course not my dear! But your mom knows you're here, right?"

"Yeah. I called and left a message"

"Good. How's she?"

"Pregnant"

"Really?"

"Yup"

"Oh, what great news! I'll call her latter to say congratulations"

"She'll be happy about that" Erika answered with a fake smile before Kristi finally let the two of them alone.

"So…" Alexis began while brushing her short dark brown hair, her blue eyes were shinning in hidden excitement "What we gonna do tonight?" Erika threw herself on Alexis' bed and exhaled hard. "Nah, nah! Don't come with that shit to me! Come on, it's Friday!"

Erika sat and hugged a cushion "What you have in mind?"

"Well…" Alexis clicked her lips, Erika knew she already had a plan "You remember Dan, right?"

"Aaaah no! No! NO!"

"You didn't even let me finish!"

"'Cause I know where this is gonna end!"

"Where?"

"You setting me up another blind date that will end up with me getting drunk because I can't stand the shit head who's by my side!"

"All I did was try to help you!"

"Aahh please…"

"Ok, whatever! BUT that's not it! It's not a blind date, you go with me!"

"Oh God!" Erika made a disgusted expression and Alexis threw her a cushion, what made Erika to laugh.

"Not like that dumb ass! Apparently, the band he's into has a gig scheduled at Nit's. He invited me to go and told me to bring a female friend, which means you!"

"No blind date my ass!"

"He's gonna play Ka! We'll both just sit and enjoy! Plus, he said female to make sure I wouldn't bring another guy!" Erika eyed her suspiciously "Come oooon!"

"What if they suck?" Alexis sighed "You know I HATE to listen to crappy music, it makes me angrier than normal!"

"Argh! Ok, here's the deal: we go, if they suck or you don't enjoy yourself AT ALL, I'll give you my Brad Pitt poster!"

"Holy shit, really?"

"Yeah!"

"Ok then… I think I can stand a shitty night for a Brad Pitt in my room!" Erika answered smiling.

"Man, is it for real?" Jack asked on the phone to Dan. Inside the envelope there was a white ID card for the Nit's night club and bar, it informed the others that he was performing there tonight.

"Yeah dude!" He answered laughing "We all got one"

"Awesome! That place is full of rich bastards, no wonder why everyone wanna have a gig there, they give good tips!"

"Just what we need Jackie! I'm tellin' you man, tonight is my night! I also have another date with Alexis"

"Aaahh here we go…"

"Watch it! I like her!"

Jack brushed into laughing "You mean you haven't fucked her yet?!"

"No, what's the matter?"

"You're such a pussy!"

"Fuck you Jack-O! Mock now and cry yourself later!"

"Dude, that sounded like shit!"

"Shut up, you'll still be in the same position as me, I'm tellin' ya!"

"Yeah, yeah! Whatever… I'll see ya tonight"

"See ya!"

After hanging up the phone Jack laughed out loud to himself, listening to Dan was so funny, he was falling for the rich ass girl. She was hot, no doubt with that, but let's face it: he was a wannabe rockstar, had nothing to do with the girly! Jack finally shook those thoughts off his head and went upstairs to practice by himself. He had to kick asses tonight.

"Oh crap!" Alexis exclaimed at the same time they parked near the club.

"What?"

"You don't have your fake ID with you, do you? It's at your house! Damn!" Alexis slapped her forehead and Erika smiled.

"Relax Alex, I don't step out of bed without it" She smiled as she inclined to take it from her back pocket. "Here it is" She smiled, showing off the ID.

"It's good to have a smart ass friend"

"You can count on that!"

The security looked at them and then to the IDs, without any trouble, he let them in. The club was already full of people, but not in the way that you couldn't even move your arms.

"Dan booked us a table up there" Alexis pointed to the up area of the club.

"Booked us? How sweet" Erika said sarcastically

There was another security right before the stairs, Alexis gave him her name and showed some kind of special card, again, he let them in with no problem after clipping orange bracelets on their wrists. So far, so good.

Alexis was unconsciously shaking her legs under the table and looking around every time, what was rather amusing to Erika.

"Relax Alex. You look great and he'll appear soon"

"How- what?" Alexis asked confused. Was she that obvious or Erika knew her too well to know what she was wondering?

Erika simply smiled before taking a sip from her beer.

After about half an hour they were there, the bad finally started playing. Alexis couldn't control herself and squealed like crazy when Dan waved to her. Erika watched all that amused, she was happy for her friend. Dan played the bass, while another guy set himself on the drums and a third one took the lead and set himself in front of the others, it seemed like he both singed and played guitar.

Erika couldn't really see any of them clearly, there were too many different colored lights flying around plus the bright ones on the front, so she gave up on forcing her eyes and just sat back to listen. _Not bad… not bad at all! _Someone there had a really great voice, she assumed it was the front guy. They played several songs she knew, that gave her a chance to lip sing with them.

"So, what you think?" Alexis asked with a smile when all the lights went off for a second before the DJ put some music on, the band's gig was over.

"They suck" Erika answered without a second thought.

"Liar! You're sayin' that JUST to get my Brad poster!" Alexis accused while pointing at her, but the smile never left her face.

"How can you say something like that? Would I ever lie to you?" Erika faked a broken heart

"You're a good liar, but not when you already had more than a couple of beers! Plus, I saw you lip singing"

"That only means I like the song! And I'm not drunk"

"Yet"

"Yeah, yet!" Both laughed, they already were tipsy.

"Hey!" A third voice joined them and both girls turned their faces while their laughs were still fading.

"Dan!" Alexis jumped from the chair and hugged him. "This is my best friend, Erika" She introduced after releasing him.

"Hi" Erika smiled as they shook hands

"Hey! Good to finally meet you"

She laughed "You too"

"This is my friend and band mate, Jack" He said pointing to the guy standing right behind him, who looked rather distracted and was looking somewhere else. As Jack didn't make a move, Dan elbowed him.

"Wow! What the fuck?!"

"This is Alexis and this is Erika"

"Ah, right! Hey" Jack shook the girls' hands with a small smile.

"So, can we join you?" Dan asked to Alexis

"Sure!" She answered smiling and Erika tried to hide her shock as she looked to her friend. _Not blind date my ass! I knew it!_

This wasn't exactly where Jack wanted to be. Dan would start making out with his girl and he'd have to stay here with her friend. Well, he didn't HAVE to, but he also didn't feel like being such an ass and leave her by herself, after all, she wasn't bad looking at all, he couldn't check on her body, but by her face he knew it shouldn't be bad.

"You guys are pretty good" Erika complimented with a smile. Jack was a bit taken aback by her starting a conversation.

"Thanks" Damn, he didn't know what else to say

"How long you've been playing?"

"Ah, that's tough! I guess we're together since 9th grade"

"Cool"

"What about ya, you play anything?"

"Ha!" Erika laughed "I started taking acoustic guitar classes, but as much as I wanted to learn it, I suck! It's hard to admit, but I do"

Jack cracked a laugh "Daddy told you it was ok to give up?" He asked sarcastically, thinking she wouldn't understand what he really meant.

She took a sip of her beer before replaying "He wasn't with me when I started learning… Nice way to call me a rich spoiled daddy's girl, by the way" Again, Jack laughed "You thought I wouldn't notice that, huh?"

"At least clever is one way to describe you"

"What would be the others?" She asked interested to hear what this guy who just met her had to say.

"How old are you?"

She sighed "Are you one of those guys who doesn't talk to underage girls because you might get arrested if you screw them?"

Again, Jack was taken aback and laughed to mask his surprise. Maybe she wasn't that spoiled "No, I can talk to underage girls"

"Good"

"But you don't look like one"

"Thank God the securities thought the same" Both laughed.

Alexis and Dan were having a serious making out on the corner. Sometimes Erika would look at them by the corner of her eye, just to see if everything was alright.

"Can I get ya another beer?" Jack asked

"Sure, thanks"

He smiled and got up. If someone else was there with Erika, she'd bet ten bucks that he wouldn't come back, since there was no one, she made a bet with herself and started wondering ways of entertain herself. Maybe dancing wouldn't be so bad? About five minutes and he hadn't come back yet, yeah he had left her. Without signs of someone who had just been dumped, she got up and gracefully walked to the stairs, like if nothing had happened. She was in the middle of the stairs when she met Jack.

"Where you going?" He asked, two bottles of beer in hand. She couldn't help but smile.

"Bathroom" She spoke quickly

"There's one up there"

"There's a huge line inside" Lie!

"Oh, ok!" Erika gave him a last smile before starting to go down the stairs "Hey!" He called and she turned "You really are goin' to the bathroom, right? You're not gonna leave me by myself in a table with two beers like a lonely bastard, are you?"

Now she really laughed, that was exactly what she feared he'd do to her "No, I'll be right back"

"'K!"

Her replies to him must have created some kind of 'respect' to her from his part. Erika was glad about it, maybe this night wouldn't suck as much as she thought. She really needed to pee anyway, so headed quickly to the bathroom.

Well, Erika isn't really a spoiled brat. She might still be a brat, but ain't spoiled, she had a descent talk and was able to curse, more than he already expected from her.

Erika got back from the bathroom and smiled as she saw that Jack hadn't started his beer.

"Hey" She greeted as she sat

"There you are"

"Thanks for waiting"

"Thanks for coming" He answered smiling. Since when he decided to be charming? They made a toast and took a long sip. "Ok, I swear I'm not high or anything, but do you have two different eye colors?"

She laughed at his first statement "Yeah if by this, you judge if you're high or not, you really aren't. I do, one is green, the other is hazel"

He furrowed his eyebrows but smiled "That's cool! I've met a girl with that before"

"Oh really? It's a pretty rare condition"

"Yeah, I was nine or something. She was my neighbor, it was also one green and another hazel. Is it always like that, the colors?"

"No, it can be… I don't know, blue and brown, hazel and blue…"

"Oh, right. And-"

"Jack" She cut him off.

"What?"

"What's your last name?"

"Mercer…why?"

"Do you have any brothers?"

"Other three. Why the hell are you asking me this?"

"Are you all adopted by your mother and live in a… not so good neighborhood?"

"Yes. Fuck, why? It's your turn to start with the money prejudice?"

Erika laughed "Jack…"

"What?" She was really freaking him out.

She smiled "I was your neighbor"


	3. When we were young

**lightning8star and lauraxxx: thank you so much for the reviews!!!**

**Hope you like this...**

She smiled "I was your neighbor"

"What?" He asked in disbelief

"My God, how could I miss that? Well, I was seven…"

"How could you be my neighbor? You're rich"

"It wasn't always like that. It takes time to make honest money Jack"

"So, you're saying that you're that little girl who woke me up while screaming happily, asking Ma to make chocolate cookies for you?"

Erika laughed at the memory, now things were passing through her head like in a movie flashback "Yes! And you're Cracker Jack!"

Now it was Jack's turn to laugh "Holy shit!"

None of them really remembered of much, they were little, most things that were shared there were due Jack's memories.

"You never let me play with your toy guitar!" Erika said half hurt

"That's because I was afraid you'd break it! Like you did with the house's vases!" She laughed "I remember Bobby used to call you Little Thunder"

"Yeah!" She squealed, that was a good year in her life. "How's everybody anyway?"

"Ma is just the same, Bobby lives in Chicago, but always visit, like now. Angel is trying to get into the Marines and Jerry just got married"

"God, I feel so bad, I didn't remember their names"

"It's ok. After all, it was ten years ago"

"Yeah… It's good to see you talking, actually" Erika smiled referring to Jack's monosyllable talks when he was young.

Jack cracked a laugh "I've been working on that"

"Are you Erika Dellrance?" Erika jumped by the sound of the voice, she turned to see a security guard by her side. _Oh shit! _Someone had probably found out about she and Alexis being underage.

"Yes…" She answered cautiously "Is there a problem?"

"Your step father is here for you"

Her eyes grew "What?!"

"And he wants you to leave right now"

"Well, tell him that I'm going to my friend's house tonight and it's still five minutes to midnight!"

"ERIKA!" The voice she least wanted to hear yelled and she soon stood up as her whole body tensed

"Is everything alright?" Jack asked genuinely worried. Erika's expression changed from happy to shocked at the mention of her step father.

"Yeah" She answered quickly and it didn't convince him for a second.

"Come on let's go!" Dracon grabbed her arm "You know you shouldn't be here" He whispered to her as he tightened his hold and Erika tried to, unsuccessfully, escape from hurting strength. Jack also stood up.

"Let go of me!"

Dracon smiled to the security "Thank you for your services. We're leaving now"

"No" Erika finally got rid of his hand around her arm and massaged the area "YOU are leaving"

"Erika don't make me-"

"Isn't it obvious that she doesn't wanna go with you? I think she's made it pretty clear for everybody" Jack cut him off. After years of abuse, he had became somewhat defensive not only over himself but other people who suffered the same, and apparently, Erika was one of them.

Dracon eyed him suspiciously "Who's this young man?" He asked to Erika, but Jack answered for himself

"Jack Mercer"

"Mercer, huh?"

"Yeah. But my name isn't the issue here. The thing is that Erika wants to stay and wants you to leave"

Dracon seemed rather amused "And what business is that of yours? I'm responsible for her"

"You can't-"

"Yes I can" He cut Jack off "Now, it wasn't a pleasure to meet you Mr. Mercer and we have to go"

Jack was shocked at how this man was such a jerk. He made attempt to reply but Erika quietly shook her head 'no' before walking away from him with no goodbye and with the asshole right behind her. He didn't know anything about her life now, but of one thing he was sure: she'd have a lot to handle.

"Jack, what just happened here?" Alexis asked worriedly while she fixed her hair, Dan was behind her, looking confused.

"Her step father came to pick her up"

"Oh shit!" Her eyes grew, almost as much as Erika's.

"Is she gonna be alright?"

"I don't know… but I really hope so" She turned to Dan "I gotta go home"

"Alright, I'll call you later"

"Bye" She kissed him quickly "Bye Jack"

"Bye"

Alexis took off in hurry. Erika really had called home and asked Loren to let them know where she was. Damn, this was going to stink.

"I need to take my stuff at Alex's" Erika emotionless said as they were about to get into Dracon's car.

"You have hundreds of clothes, I'm sure you won't miss those" He answered in the same tone

"My school's books are there, I have homework for the weekend"

"Maybe detention would do you some good"

"What the hell are you talking about?!"

"Watch your language"

"Why are you here anyway? I called, you know where I was, I'm sure Loren gave you the message!"

"You have the right to remain silent until tomorrow Erika, don't say another word"

"Or what?!" She challenged him. Sure that wasn't a good idea and she knew it.

He laughed sarcastically "Or what? There's no 'or what', you're going to do what I'm telling you"

Erika didn't say another word, not sure why though. Ok, she was scared, she had no idea what this psychopath could do to her and she didn't want to take her chances, she was alone with him after all.

"No wonder why your father gave up on you" She opened her mouth to protest but didn't say a thing, and he continued "He said he did that because he didn't want you to suffer, right? Great excuse! He didn't want to carry the burden! And now I have to"

Everything he said hurt the very deep piece of her heart, she loved her father, and as much as she tried to not think on his words, he was getting what he wanted: take her father's love away from her, after all, now he was in Germany and couldn't prove Dracon wrong. But she refused to say another word, she refused to even look at him. He knew this hurt her, that's why he kept it going.

"This problem is gonna be over though, you're mom is gonna have my baby. A real baby because let's face it, you were an accident, you broke your parents apart. My son is gonna be much smarter than you, not that this is a difficult task anyway! Anyone can be better than a mistake! Look what you do to your mother, she has been waiting for you all the time"

"Erika!" Her mom called as soon as Dracon parked the car on the garage, she was standing there, waiting for them. "Where have you been? Are you hurt?"

Erika furrowed her eyebrows "What you mean where have I been? I was at Alexis', I left a message tellin' you that!"

"You didn't honey, I've been worried sick about you!"

"Erika, I know you're scared but you must not lie to your mother." Dracon said resting a hand on Erika's shoulder, she soon flinched away. He was disgusting. "She was in a club, forbid to underage people"

"What? Honey, I know you are upset about the baby but-"

"I'm fine" Erika answered, cutting her mother off. Her eyes were red, they were tired of the fight against the tears "Go back to sleep, I'm sure you and your baby need rest. You too Dracon, go mind your own business" She said before deciding not to wait the elevator and take the stairs.

She ran up, like if some angry dog was chasing her, all she wanted was to be in her room. Erika understood exactly what happened: Loren, in her innocent ignorance, told Dracon what Erika had told her. To be the 'hero' of the story and to make her the 'uncontrolled troublemaker bastard daughter', he lied to her mother, saying he didn't know where she was and after finding her, he'd be considered the rescuer by Helen. How pathetic!

Erika reached her apartment door with no problems and hurried inside, directly to her room.

"Erika, sweetheart, are you alright?" Loren asked before knocking softly on her door.

"Yeah, I'm alright. I'll just take a shower and sleep. Thanks" She said quickly and Loren closed the door with no further questions.

Erika walked in the shower, the hot water running down on her body as tears fell from her defeated eyes.

"Jackie, you're up early! Is everything alright?"

He ran his fingers through his already messy blonde hair "Yeah" The sleep was evident on his voice.

"How was last night, with the band?"

"Good… great, actually. We made a good amount of money" He answered less excited than he should actually be.

"Honey, you sure nothing happened last night? You got home earlier than I expected you to"

"Did I wake you up?"

Evelyn smiled, she never really slept when her youngest was out "No, I'm just a light sleeper"

Jack started chewing down the pancakes she had just placed in front of him. After a while, he finally spoke

"Ma, do you remember of some neighbors we had about ten years ago?"

"Ten years? That's a long time…"

"The little girl, Erika… she had two different colored eyes"

Evelyn smiled "Yes, I remember now! Little Thunder, as Bobby used to call her" She gave a small laugh "Always breaking things around! I'm surprised you remember. What about her?"

"I met her last night"

"Really?" She looked surprised

"Yeah"

"My God, she must be all grown up now! How did you meet?"

"Her friend's dating Dan"

"Seems like the world is not that big after all, huh?"

"Yeah. But Ma …I'm… worried about her"

"Why Jackie?"

"Her step father showed up to take her home. And when he did, she got all pale and tensed up. He got a tight hold of her arm and she flinched away. The man is an asshole, Ma!"

"Jackie, you don't even know him"

"He's smug! Really, I bet the man doesn't worth the shoes he wears"

"And why are you worried about her? After all, underage teens can't go there, can they?"

"That's not the point. When I tried to help her, she just shook her head no and went away with him like a lost dog"

"You think he beats her, is that it Jackie?"

"I don't know…Maybe"

After about five minutes of silence, Evelyn spoke up "I just had an idea. Why don't you call and invite her to have dinner with us tonight?"

"I don't have her number Ma"

She smiled "I'm sure you can manage that if you really want to"

"Morning Lo" Erika said as she walked into the kitchen and sat on the balcony

"Hello Ka" Loren filled Erika's favorite mug with coffee and handed it to her with a smile "How are you feeling?" She looked directly to the purple bruise on the girl's arm.

Erika pulled her pajama's sleeve all the way down "Ok" She shrugged

"Just last night I realized what I did, I should have given the message to your mother. I'm sorry"

"It's ok Lo…"

"No kid, it's not. I wish I could do something to help you, I'm not blind, I see the way he threats you"

"Thanks Lo, but don't get yourself into it. As much as I appreciate your concern, it's not your call to make. You need this job, I know it pays well, so just let it go" Erika answered with a small smile "Besides, I need someone here who believes me. If you get fired, how am I gonna deal with this?"

"Aaaww child" Loren hugged Erika "You're good. You're gonna find the right help to walk out of this" Erika smiled "Now, tell me, how was your night?"

"It was good! Better than I expected, to be honest!"

"Oh, I'm glad to hear that"

"You know I lived here a long time ago, right?"

"Yes"

"Well, I met the guy who used to be my neighbor back there!"

"Really? Wow! Looks like fate just played a trick with you"

"Aaahh Lo, don't come with this fate bullshit to me, you know I don't buy that" She said laughing as she started looking between the stuff on the balcony where she was sat.

"What you looking for?"

"Chocolate cookies"

"You already ate them all"

"Crap…"

"But here, have those"

"What's this?"

"Chocolate sticks"

"Sounds good!"

"Anyway, it's not bullshit young lady. Detroit is a big city! I'm surprised you remembered him though"

"I didn't… he asked about my eyes and then said he had met a girl with the same condition when he was little… I just asked a couple of questions and put the pieces together"

"Clever"

"That's what he said" She answered with her mouth full of chocolate.

"And does this neighbor have a name?"

"Jack. Jack Mercer"

"Mercer? As in Evelyn Mercer?"

"Yeah, that's his mother's name, if I remember well. You know her?"

Loren smiled "She's the sweetest creature alive! I used to work on a grocery store near her house. I've met two of her sons, Bobby and Jerry"

"Bobby used to call me Little Thunder because I'd always break something, vases mostly"

Loren laughed "Some things never change"

"Hey!"

"Evelyn told me when she took Jack in, I think I saw him once or so. Is he skinny and blonde?"

"He's blonde and really tall, but definitely not skinny, I mean, he's got muscles"

"And you checked on him!"

"Well, that's my job as a girl, right?" She laughed. Her cell phone started ringing. She moaned as she got down from the balcony and went to her room.

"Hello?"

"Hey. Erika?"

"Yeah. Who's this?" She was already back to the kitchen

"I'm really touched to know that you recognize my voice after all the childhood memories we shared"

She smiled "How you doin' Cracker Jack?"

Erika missed this, but Loren smiled to herself as she heard who Erika was talking to.

"I'm fine, you?"

"Good"

"Really?"

She laughed "Yeah, why?"

"Are you sure?" Jack knew that she would tell him if anything had happened, they weren't that close.

"Ok, maybe you're high now" She heard Jack laughing

"I can assure you that I'm not"

"If you say so…"

"Anyway, I told Ma I met you and well, she invited you for dinner tonight"

"Your mother invited me to have dinner there tonight?" She asked rhetorically while trying to hide a smile. Too late, Loren had already seen it and chuckled.

"You're rich but can't buy yourself a hearing equipment or something?" Jack asked amused

"At least this problem is much easier to be fixed than stupidity" Erika answered with acid humor, what made Jack to laugh

"Ouch! Alright… you comin'?"

"I need to talk to my mom first. Can I call you back when I have my answer?"

"Sure, ask mommy and call me later"

"Fuck you Jack" She said laughing and he laughed back. None waited for good bye to hang up.

Loren turned and smiled at her

"What? Ah no! Don't start making things up!" She jumped back on the balcony.

"I didn't say a thing!"

"But you thought! I KNOW you did!" Erika accused while pointing at Loren playfully

"If you know what I thought, it's because you thought it as well!"

"What? That's- ugh! Whatever… How am I gonna do this?"


	4. Yell if you get lost

**Thank you Ally and Lauraxxx for the reviews! PLEASE, keep it coming! **

**Enjoy...**

"…How am I gonna do this?"

"Do what?" Loren asked as the front door opened. Erika placed her index finger on her lips and Loren nodded, she wouldn't say a word.

"Good morning sweetie" Her mom greeted as she walked in the kitchen and looked for water. Just like she did every Saturday morning. Helen and Dracon always took the morning to walk around and talk about whatever they talked about in a quiet place, it was usually a park near the building where they lived and they didn't get home until almost lunch time.

"Morning mom"

After drinking water, Helen cleaned her mouth and kissed her daughter's cheek.

"Good morning Erikan" Dracon said with a damn fake smile and Erika rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, hi"

"Get down from the balcony. How many times do I have tell you that the chair is the right place to sit? Loren, why do you let her sit up there?"

"She didn't see me, ok? Look" Erika jumped off "I'm already down. Alright?"

Dracon shook his head and Erika wished she could just break his neck.

"Honey, what do you think about having lunch just you and me today? Dracon has a meeting"

"On a Saturday?" Erika suspiciously asked while raising an eyebrow. Not that she really cared about having his presence during lunch.

"On the contrary of what many people might think, I work hard" Dracon answered

"Good for you" Erika answered and turned to go to her room to get changed, trying hard to hide a smile and swallow a laugh at his shocked face.

"Helen, did you hear that?" He bitched and Erika covered her mouth while she was on the hall, she couldn't laugh there.

"Oh honey, she's just a teen, you know how rebel they can be"

_Whoa, my mom is standing up for me! Miraculous day!_

"Yes, but that's not how a Winters must behave"

"Whoa!" Erika yelled from the hall, where she still was, and ran back to the kitchen "My advantage is that I'm NO Winters, right? SO, I can behave as a Winters wouldn't because I'm a Dellrance… lucky me!"

Dacron glared at her and she smiled. He wouldn't do anything to her in front of her mother. The thing is that she was still too inexpedient, she totally forgot that anytime she could be alone with him.

"Erika, go take a shower so we can go eat somewhere"

"Ok!" She answered happily. An extra meal without Dracon's company was everything she wanted today. Helen loved Evelyn back when they were neighbors, it'd be easy to convince her mother to let her go and visit them without Dragon's dark company.

"You really met Jack again?" Helen asked surprised after Erika told her mother what happened last night.

"I'm telling you mom! And Evelyn invited me to have dinner with them tonight, can I go?" Erika asked with an innocent smile, anyone would think she was an angel on Earth.

"Sure" Her mother smiled "I'll make sure to take you myself"

"Fine" Erika smiled "I'll be right back" Erika excused herself and went to the restaurant's bathroom. There, she dialed the last number who called her.

"Yeah?"

By the answering and the voice, she already knew who it was "Please don't tell me that you've been waiting by the side of the phone"

"Damn, you noticed! But it's ok, I won't disappoint you: I wasn't"

"Good" She laughed

"Talked to mommy yet?"

"Yup, she's actually taking me herself"

"How cute"

"Shut up, she wants to meet Evelyn"

"Now you hurt my feelings, what about the sons? We don't get anything?"

"You're such a cry baby Cracker Jack! I gotta go"

"Ok, see ya tonight"

"See ya"

"Is everything alright, honey?"

"Yeah mom, just had to pee"

"Shush Erika! You're in a restaurant"

"So what? I bet five hundred bucks that everybody here pees"

"But that's not the right place for a subject like this! And nice girls don't make bets"

"Gee… you and Dracon's shit"

"Honey… There's a reason behind our lunch"

"Oh! Of course there is, you can't just spend some quality time with your daughter with no reason, can you?" Erika said acidly

"Erika! Why is it so hard to talk to you?"

"Sometimes I think the same about you!"

"Look, I know you might be upset about the baby" Erika sighed and Helen ignored it "But this is going to be fun! Dracon and I are so happy, why can't you be?"

"Because he's Dracon's baby!"

"Why do you attack him so much? Erika, he adores you!"

"Jesus Christ! Did the pregnancy make you blind or something?" Erika lifted her sleeve up to show the purple bruise his extremely tight hold made on her "Look how much he adores me!"

"Erika, you're crossing the edge to call attention to yourself! Drac would never do that!"

Erika almost puked at the sound of 'Drac', it was ridiculous.

"Of course mom, your prince charming would NEVER do that. I must have hit somewhere"

"Yes, you just don't remember it"

Erika's eyes grew. She used the harshest of the sarcasm on her sentence and her mother bought it! She did whatever she could to open her mother's eyes but seemed like Helen had glued them together. She was alone on this.

"Can we go?"

"Yes"

"Before going home, can we pass at Alex's to pick my stuff up?"

"Sure"

"Neighbors?" Alexis asked shocked while Erika was getting her stuff and telling Alexis what happened while she was busy making out with Dan.

"Yup. Small world, huh?"

"Small world?! That's destiny Ka!"

"Oh God, here we go…"

"No! I'm serious! See?! SEE?! I TOLD you, we'd have fun there!"

"It's a pity though… I lost the Pitt poster"

"You know what? I'm so happy for you, that I'm gonna give this to you, anyway!"

"Really?"

"Yes!" Alexis squealed as she started taking the paper from her wall.

"If I tell you that I'm gonna have dinner at his house, do I get the Tom Welling's as well?"

Alexis' eyes grew "You are?"

Erika couldn't help but smile while nodding "Yeah"

"Isn't it too soon to meet the family?" Alexis joked and Erika lightly hit her with the baseball bat she was playing around with "Ouch!"

"Shut the fuck up! I've already MET his family! Ten years ago…"

"Things might be in a different way now. You know, ten years is a lot of time, you're both grown up"

"You say another crap like that and I won't go easy on you!" Erika raised the bat and Alexis put her hands up defensively.

"Oh My God! Erika!" Evelyn squealed before pulling the girl into her arms. A hug that Erika happily corresponded.

"It's been a long time Miss Mercer"

"Oh please, what happened to 'Eve'? You're grown up but there's no need to threat me differently"

"Sorry Eve" Erika smiled

"Helen, my dear, you look great" Evelyn smiled at Erika's mother before hugging her at the same way. Helen closed her eyes tightly as she hugged Evelyn back.

"So do you Evelyn!"

"Aww you're being too kind! But let's not keep you girls out here! Come in! Come in!"

Erika and Helen followed Evelyn inside the house. They found Jack laid on the couch while watching TV, when he realized he had company, he quickly got up, letting the remote to fall on the floor.

"Is this Jack?" Helen asked to Evelyn. She was impressed by how tall and good looking he was.

"Yeah, that's my Jackie" Evelyn said all proud. For a second, Erika wished that her mother could speak of her like that and not like she did when the went to those crappy fancy parties, like if Erika was just a beautiful accessory she had by her side.

"Hey" Jack said a bit awkward and shook hands with Helen. He winked at Erika with small a grin, and she shyly smiled back.

"You've done a pretty good job Evelyn. You should be proud"

"Thank you. I am" She smiled up at Jack "You should be proud as well. Erika's turned into a beautiful young lady"

"She really is. If just someone could put some good sense into her head…"

Erika bitted her lower lip and lowered her head. It'd probably kill her mother to compliment her in front of the others.

"Aww I'm sure she's just fine!" Evelyn smiled to Erika, though she didn't see it. "Would you like to stay for dinner?"

"Oh, I'd love too! But I just can't… Dracon should be home soon"

"Dracon?"

"My husband"

"Oh right! Why don't you call him and ask him to come too?"

"I'm sure he'd be thrilled about it" Erika quickly raised her head and frowned her eyebrows at the lie her mother was telling. Jack didn't miss that, since his eyes were analyzing the girl. "But he had a meeting today and must be really tired" Erika rolled her eyes.

"Oh, I understand. Make sure to pass by some other time then!"

"Certainly! Thank you so much for the invitation" Helen hugged Evelyn once more "Bye"

"Bye sweetie"

"Behave yourself Erika"

"Yeah mom bye to you too" Erika answered with no effort to smile and pretend to be nice.

"Ouch!" Jack laughed as Evelyn closed the door. "Something here tells me that you ain't havin' a good time with mommy"

"Will you just stop that Cracker Jack?" Erika asked annoyed. The 'mommy' thing really hit her nerves.

"Yeah Jackie, be nice and don't get into Erika's business" Evelyn slapped with a smile and Erika laughed after sticking her tongue out at Jack, who merely glared.

"Eve, may I use the bathroom?"

"Of course dear, you don't need to ask. You remember the way?"

"I think so" She answered before turning to go upstairs.

"Yell if you get lost" Jack said and she gave him the finger behind her back, what made him to laugh.

Erika headed upstairs and went to where she thought the bathroom was, the house was just like she very vaguely she remembered of it. On her way out, she stopped in front of a dark room, she knew there was Jack's room, the curiosity kicking in her brain kept telling her to come in and give it a quick check. But what would he think of her? After all, they weren't friends like they were in the past, maybe not yet, but she thought it was better to let it go.

Since she turned the bathroom's light off, the hall was dark, except for one single light coming from the middle of the wall, it was yellow-ish and only served to projected shadows. She knew that somewhere you could light a better one, but she had no idea where. Despite the cozy atmosphere the house had, this particular place was giving her the creeps, so she decided to soon get back downstairs. She turned and bumped into something dark, almost the same height as her. That was enough for her to scream on the top of her lungs.

"Holy shit! Shut the fuck up!" A voice shouted, which only served for her to freak out more and move back. As she did, she hit a little table with her back, what caused something that was on it to fall and crash on the floor, what made her to scream again. That all happened so fast that just then she noticed that she had been holding her breath.

The good light was quickly turned on by Jack, who came upstairs running with Evelyn behind him.

"Who the fuck are you?" Bobby asked to the girl not too far from him who had her hand on her chest.

"Bobby, watch your language!" Evelyn censured him. By the sound of his name, Erika lowered her hand and started breathing calmly, she even managed to give him a small smile.

"Sorry Ma. Who's she?" Evelyn and Jack smiled at him. Bobby looked at Jack and then back to the girl. "You know he's a fairy, right?" He pointed at Jack

"Fu-" He started but stopped as soon as Evelyn's slap met his stomach.

Erika chuckled "What's wrong? You don't remember me?" She asked with a smart ass smile on her face.

Bobby got closer of the girl and looked her right into her eyes, she smiled. He looked at the vase broken near her and then back at her, his features eased.

"What's your problem with the vases, Little Thunder?" He asked with a small smile

Erika giggled before impulsively throwing her arms around him, he laughed while hugging her back.

"How you doing girl? Damn, look at you!"

"It's nice to see you too Bobby" Erika smiled at him before turning and kneeling to catch the pieces of the broken vase.

"Old habits die hard, huh?"

"Hey, that was YOUR fault!"

"Mine?! Why?"

"Because you freaked the shit out of me!"

"What were you doing here anyway? Why didn't anyone let me know she was here?"

"We didn't even hear you coming in Bobby" Evelyn answered "Sweetie, don't mind with that. I can clean it"

"No way" Erika smiled "I'm big enough to clean my mess Eve, you don't need to do that for me anymore"

"Jackie, go get a plastic bag"

"I'll pay you back Eve, I promise!"

"Oh Erika, don't mind with it! It's just an old vase"

"Yeah, it was Ma's favorite and now you destroyed it. Way to go Thunder" He decided that 'little' clearly didn't fit on her anymore.

"Don't listen to him, honey"

"Thanks a lot Bobs!" She said sarcastically

Jack cracked a laugh at the sound of 'Bobs' as he kneeled to help Erika. She remembered that at first, by some reason she couldn't say Bobby right, she always ended up saying Bobbyz. After a while, she already could pronounce it right but it wasn't fun because everybody else called him like that, so she decided to stay with Bobs. She was the only one who he actually allowed to call him like that, because she was little, but now, she wasn't very sure.

"Shut up Fairy" He pointed at Erika "Don't call me like that in front of the others"

"Well, I'll finish the dinner" Evelyn excused herself and went downstairs. Bobby didn't say a thing and got in his room.

"That's my room, that's Bobby's room, that's the bathroom, that's mom's room and that's the guest room" Jack said while pointing at the rooms "And this is the hall" Erika shot him a puzzled look and he smiled "You yelled, now you ain't lost anymore"

"Damn Jack, never say a crap like that again! That was awful!"


	5. Me neither

**Thank you, AshleyM and Lauraxxx (especially you, for being so supportive!(sp? lol))**

**Also, thanks to you who have added this story or me in some kind of alert! **

**Enjoy and tell me what ya think!**

"My God Eve, that was delicious!" Erika said right after cleaning her mouth with the napkin. She felt like if she'd explode.

"Ah dear, I'm glad you liked it" Evelyn answered with a big smile "Now, why don't you all go chill on the couch?"

"Hey Erin, you still a bad hockey player as you were back there?" Bobby asked while getting up. Erika rolled her eyes at the nickname.

"If not worse"

"Damn girl, you disappoint me! What they teach on school those days?"

"Things that I know shit about"

"Maybe you don't disappoint me that much"

Erika laughed as she gathered the plates and placed them on the sink.

"Dear, you don't need to do that"

"I want to" Erika replied to Evelyn with a smile. After helping washing the dishes, Erika went to the tv room, where Bobby and Jack were.

"So Erin, what happened to you after you left?"

"Why are you callin' me Erin?"

"Just 'cause it bugs you"

"It doesn't bug me!"

"Alright Erin, answer the question then" Bobby answered with a smart ass smirk.

"Ok. Resuming, after I left, I moved to Chicago. When I was fourteen my dad said we'd have to go back to Canada, my mom didn't accept it and asked for divorce. As if that wasn't all enough, my mom wanted to fight over my custody. In dad's words: he didn't want me to go through it, since it's too painful for the kid" Bobby nodded at this "So, since he'd keep traveling and couldn't give me a stable life as he should, he gave my custody to my mother. We kept livin' in Chicago, just me and her until when God knows how she met Dracon Winters and he became my step father. He was the one who brought us back here"

"Jackie here mentioned that step father of yours is an ass"

Erika gave a small laugh, Bobby was being protective over her and she missed having someone doing that "Damn, he really is"

"In which way?"

"In all ways" Erika answered briefly. She really didn't want to bother them with all this and quickly came up with another subject "What you've been up to Bobs?"

"Ah you know Erin, just takin' care of business…"

"What about you Jack?"

Bobby laughed "You really wanna know? He sucks di-"

"Shut the fuck up!" Jack cut him off "Just trying to go on with this band thing"

"Cool" She smiled and looked at the clock "Damn, it's already late. I should probably get going" She said while taking her cell phone out of her back pocket.

"Aww gonna call mommy to pick you up?" Jack joked with a smile

"No dick head, I'm call a cab"

Bobby leaned back while laughing and Jack shot her a dirty look.

"There ain't no need to call a crappy cab Thunder, come on, I'll take ya"

"You don't need to Bobs, really, it's fine"

"Yeah, you don't need to Bobs" Jack joked "I'll take her"

"What ya talkin' about fairy?! You don't even know how to drive, you're gonna crash my whole fuckin' car!"

"Bobby!" Evelyn censured as she joined them.

"Sorry Ma"

"Jackie, you take Erika" Jack smiled triumphantly and Bobby opened his mouth to protest, but Evelyn didn't give him a chance to "You stay because I need to talk to you"

"Someone's here is screwed!"

"Mind your own business Jackie!"

"Ouch!" Erika laughed. "Thank you so much Eve, for everything" She said after hugging Evelyn

"Don't you dare to disappear again, young lady"

"I promise!" She smiled "I also promise I'll buy you another vase" Evelyn laughed and didn't mind in protest, she knew the girl wouldn't give up on the idea of paying her back.

"Bye Bobs!"

Bobby held her tightly "Good to see ya Thunder. Take care of yourself"

"Yeah you too"

"Come on Erin, let's go" Jack said and Erika glared at him, what made him too laugh.

"Bye guys"

"What's up ma?" Bobby asked as Jack closed the front door and Evelyn sat on the couch.

"You know who her step father is, don't you?"

Bobby exhaled hard and jerked his head back "Yeah"

"Great Saturday night for you, huh? Delivering old neighbors around" Erika said when they were close to where she lived.

"No problem" He answered with a small smile.

"Wouldn't you better call your girlfriend and tell her you'll be late?"

Jack couldn't help but smile amused "No"

"No, because she'll understand or no, because you haven't got one?"

"I haven't got one"

"Are you really gay?"

Jack hit the brakes and the belt strongly held her body, hurting her neck a bit.

"You ask a lot of questions" Jack looked at her, half amused, half mad.

"It's the last one, I promise" She answered with a small innocent smile

"I'm not gay Erika"

She smiled "Me neither" She got out of the car "Thanks for the ride Cracker Jack"

He laughed out loud "No problem" and drove off.

"Enjoyed yourself?" Dracon's voice said as Erika passed by the living room, causing her to jump in surprise. He was sat on an armchair with nothing but the lampshade by his side illuminating him.

She soon recomposed herself and lifted her chin up a bit "Very much"

"Good. Because that was the last time you'll ever see your old friends"

"What are you talking about?!"

"Low down your voice when you're talking to me"

"You should be sleeping"

"Don't you dare to tell me what I should be doing!"

"You know, I'm sleepy. Bye"

"Stay right where you are" Erika did exactly what he told her, and hated herself for that. He got up from where he was and placed himself behind her. He grabbed her arm on the already sore spot and dragged her to her room.

"What the fuck are you doing? Let go of me!"

"You asked" He threw her on the wall with probably all the strength he possessed. Her right side hit the tick wall with such strength that it even caused Erika to step back after crashing on it.

"MOM!" She yelled and Dracon laughed

"She won't wake up"

"You KILLED her?! YOU FUCKIN' BASTARD!"

"No. She was just too stressed and I helped her to sleep. And you need to learn how to treat me right" Before Erika could make any move, he slapped on her face. She couldn't see it, but anyone who looked at her could see his finger's red outline on her porcelain white skin. He grabbed her throat "Behave yourself. Don't even dream about telling this to your mother or anyone at all! Get near of those Mercers again, and you'll se what I'm capable of. And that was nothing, you just hit your head on the nightstand when you fell from the bed on your sleep"

He finally let go of her and she gasped for air. Dracon got out of her room and closed the door, leaving Erika sat on the floor of her room, still trying to catch her breath. As she did, she hurriedly reached for the door and locked it before going to her bathroom. She sighed as she saw the deep cut right above her right eyebrow, she took a quick shower, cleaned it and set herself to sleep. Not once a tear left her eyes, maybe the physical abuse was better than the psychological one. She was sure that his words hurt her more than his hands, but she was also sure that all that wasn't even a descent fraction of what he'd be able to do to her. What did her mother get them into?

This was the first time Dracon ever laid a hand on her like that. It seemed like the baby wouldn't make the Dragon to stop breathing down her neck… it would make him to breath fire on her.

"Man, now you're officially off the gross scale!" Jack said to Charlie, his other band mate. Charlie was showing off his butt on the webcam for a girl when Jack got into his room. Totally disgusted by that, Jack turned the webcam off.

"What? She called me a geek"

"Oh and showing off your naked ass online is cool?"

"Well, it's already something"

"Why don't you try getting yourself a real woman?"

"Ha! It's easy for you to say! But the problem is… whenever we meet a new girl, you snap her first before I get a chance to make my moves"

"Oh, so I'm supposed to put my sex life on hold so you can just get some?!"

Charlie nodded "That's what a friend would do"

"Alright then… Whenever we meet a new girl, you get first dibs"

"You promise?"

Jack nodded and Charlie smiled before both shook hands

"Where were you Friday night after the gig?"

Charlie sighed "By some reason the fucking security guard didn't let me go up there with you guys"

"Really? Why didn't you call us?"

"I did! You guys didn't hear me. So I just stood down there"

"Got a girl there at least?"

"Kinda of"

"Kinda of? Fuck dude, what are you?"

Charlie took a deep breath "We kissed and all, but then, when I was about to take the next step, she left!"

Jack started laughing "Dude, you need some seriously help, you suck!"

"Good morning honey" Helen greeted as Erika joined her and Dracon on the table to eat breakfast, she carefully sat on the chair to not make the sore spots even more painful.

"Good morning Erikan"

"Good morning" She answered in a low voice

"Erika, what happened to your eyebrow?" Helen asked while trying to reach for the cut, but Erika flinched away, by the corner of her eye, she could see Dracon staring at her.

"I hmm… I hit on my nightstand"

"How?"

"I rolled off bed during the night"

"I really don't know how you can do this"

"Me neither"

"Maybe that's why she keeps doing things wrong, she hits her head too much" Dracon said amused, Helen and him laughed at the totally not funny joke while Erika just chewed her pancakes, looking down at her plate. Her mother was still a good cooker, considering that it was Sunday and Loren's day off, it was Helen's day to make the breakfast.

"So, how was last night with Evelyn?" Helen asked looking at Erika, who merely looked up.

"Great"

"I was amazed at how tall Jack is!"

"Yeah, he really is"

"Baby, do you really know those Mercers?" Dracon got in the middle of the conversation.

"Yes! There were our neighbors for one year, great people!"

"I don't think so…"

"What you mean?"

"You see, I'm from here. I know them and know for sure that they aren't good people to be around"

"Really?"

"Yes. That's why last night I asked Erika to not be around them anymore. Especially around the oldest, that man means trouble and he's rude. I'm afraid of what he could do to Erika"

"Oh my God! I'd never think of something like this! Erika, honey, listen to Dracon-"

"What?" Erika finally looked up "You really believe him? You can't be serious!"

"Erika, he lives here since always!"

"But he never lived with the Mercers! They ARE good people and you know that! Mom, how can you possibly say that Evelyn is a bad person?"

"Their mother is old Erika, the oldest controls everything and everyone there" Dracon said

"His name is Bobby"

"That's not a name, that's a nickname"

"Whatever!"

"Erika, listen to Dracon! Do what he says, he knows about things! He's just trying to protect you! I know you must be shocked, I am too, but you must trust on his word"

Erika simply shook her head and didn't say another word. That all was unbelievable! He was a stinking liar and her mother was a dumb ass who believed in every poisoned word he said without even questioning him! She didn't have a clue that he gave her pain killers to knock her out last night. Erika couldn't figure out why he was doing all this, why was he with her mother? Why he even got interested on her, even knowing she already had a kid? Too many questions and no answer.

"Erika, we're going to have lunch at Ivy an then are going to spend the afternoon walking around and maybe do some shopping for the baby, would you like to join us?" Helen asked after taking a final sip of her orange juice.

"No thanks. I'd rather stay because I still got plenty of homework to do"

"Alright sweetie. We're leaving now because we have some things to take care of"

"Fine. Bye" Dracon shot her a dirty look "Have fun" She said sarcastically as he passed by.

When the door finally closed, she had a chance to breath again. As if yesterday's beating wasn't enough, now Dragon was trying to split her from the Mercers, something was going on there and she'd find out what.

Erika cleaned the breakfast's mess and locked herself in her room to have all the homework done, taking a few breaks to play some video game and to eat something. As that, the Sunday went away, she missed dinner because she fell asleep on her maths book. She woke up with a terrible backache and simply managed to threw herself on bed to have a restless night of sleep. Another week was about to begin.


	6. You gotta remember our pact

**Lauraxxx, thank you so much for the review and thanks to those who have added this to any alert! ;)**

**Please, review people!!!**

"Oh Ka, rough night?" Alexis sarcastically asked Erika while they headed to their first class, referring to the cut on her eyebrow.

"You have no idea" She answered in the same tone.

"What you have now? Dear maths?"

"Hell no! English"

"Lucky, I got History. I'll see ya back in Geography then, ok?"

"Sure, see ya Alex"

They broke apart and each girl headed to their respective classes. Erika silently walked in her English class and sat on the 4th desk, her usual spot.

"Hello Erika"

She looked up from her notebook to the guy standing in front of her.

"Oh, hi Nate" She answered not meaning to be impolite, but she really wasn't interested on his talk.

That was Nathaniel Queen, rich spoiled boy whose father was friends with Dracon. That was enough for stupid Dracon to think that Nate was the perfect match for Erika, and enough for her to think he wasn't. He wasn't a bad kid and was even somewhat handsome, but had the thought that all that matters in this life is money and for Erika's sadness, he also thought they matched.

He took his brown hair off his blue eyes "How was your weekend?"

Erika gave him a small smile "Nice, yours?"

"It was good. I went to play golf with my uncle"

She raised her eyebrows and tried to hold back a laugh "Sounds exciting"

He probably just chose to ignore her sarcasm "You should come with us someday"

"Trust me, you don't wanna leave me by myself with a golf club and a ball… it's dangerous"

He laughed "It would be no problem to teach you"

Luckily, she didn't have to answer since the teacher walked in the class and told everyone to sit down so he could begin the class.

"He really invited you to play golf?" Alexis asked in disbelief as the two girls headed to the parking lot.

"Ridiculous, I know! Me, playing golf? Give me a break!" Both laughed out loud as they got into Erika's Jeep.

They had planned to go to a nearby park after class and play with the video camera Erika had brought.

Alexis started filming "Come on, introduce yourself"

"Hi! I'm Erika and I… I don't know what else to say!" She laughed

"How old are you?"

"Seventeen and counting to turn eighteen, that means one month!"

"Are we gonna have some kickin' ass party then?"

"Hell yeah!"

"Now Erika, tell us, who's your crush?"

"Where the hell that came from?"

"It's just a question! Don't curse, I'm filming you"

She rolled her eyes "Sorry mom! And I have no crush"

"Ah come on!"

"I'm serious!"

"So, how would the perfect guy look alike for ya?"

"Hmm… Something close to Brad Pitt?" She laughed a bit embarrassed.

"Tall, blonde and green eyes?"

"Yeah, that's pretty much it"

"Whoa, guess today is your lucky day then!"

"Why's that?"

"Cuz there's a guy like that walking towards you right now" Alexis answered smiling while recording everything.

"Cut!" Erika said before turning her back to the camera to check what her friend was talking about and she ended up seeing the last person she expected to see there: Jack Mercer, with Dan right behind him.

"Hey" Jack greeted first with a smile

"You lost?" Erika asked with a grin

"Yeah. Maybe you can give me some directions?" He played along

"Where to?"

"Never mind, you're too young to hear those things" He smirked at her, what caused her to instinctively slap on his arm and as a consequence of all that, he laughed out loud. "What you doing here anyway? I thought we were going to eat?"

"What?" Erika frowned at Alexis "You planned this? And can you **please** stop recording this already?"

"Aaww what's up Ka, don't feel comfortable in front of the cameras?" Dan teased

"No, I'm not as much Paris Hilton as you" She snapped with a sarcastic smile

"Ouch! I agree with her Alex, turn that thing off. That's embarrassing."

"Fine!" Before finally calling an end to the video, Alex zoomed on a laughing Jack. She then turned to her friend, Erika was still waiting for an answer. "I just thought it'd be fun to have them around"

"What's up Erin? Got a problem?" Jack grinned

She never thought for a second about stop seeing any of the Mercers just because Dracon told her to, but they were in the neighborhood and there was a big chance of getting caught, and after that night, that scared the shit out of her.

"With you? Hell yeah" Once again she hided her worries with sarcasm "Call me Erin again and I might break your legs"

"Yeah right! Are we gonna eat or what?"

"Can we go somewhere far from here?"

"Why?" Alexis asked confused and Jack eyed Erika suspiciously. The cut above her eyebrow surely caught his eye and now she didn't want to be around her own neighborhood, something was up with her.

She shrugged "Just wanna go somewhere new"

"Let's go to the Falcon" Dan said and the two girls looked up at him with questioning eyes "It's a coffee shop, good place to hang out and it's a safe distance from here, if that's what you want"

"Sounds good"

"Then let's go, I'm starving!" Jack cried

"Damn, Jack stop thinking about food!" Dan laughed

"Kinda hard to do that when your stomach keeps reminding you with weird sounds that you're hungry"

Erika chuckled "Let's go kill Jack's monster"

They all started walking to the cars, just when Erika was about to get into hers that she noticed Jack had followed her.

"What you doing?"

"Going with you" She raised an eyebrow at him "Alexis is going with Dan, you really didn't expect me to go with them, did you?"

She laughed "No. Come on"

Erika drove slowly as she followed Dan's car.

"What were you doing with the camera anyway?" Jack asked while he took the object from the dashboard.

"Just having fun"

"Oh yeah? Say 'hi' Ka" Jack said while focusing the camera on her, she had just stopped the car on the red traffic light.

She couldn't help but smile when he called her Ka, she looked over him "Ah Jack, turn that thing off!" She cried half laughing

He turned the camera to himself "She's shy" Then turned it back to her "What happened to your eyebrow?" He asked with no smile and the one she had on her face soon faded away.

"Turn that off Jack, please"

"Did your step father do this?"

Erika lost her patience and took the camera from Jack's hand, soon turning it off. "No, and I have no idea where you took this idea from. I hit my head on my nightstand"

Jack was kind of taken aback by her reaction, she got pissed before he could blink his eyes.

"Got an attitude there for someone who just hit the head"

She fully turned her body to face him "What you mean?"

"You know what I mean"

"No I don't, you're delusional!"

"I'm just trying to help you!

"Thanks, but I think you can't control my dreams and neither can I. There's no big deal Jack"

Someone pressed the horn behind her and just then she realized she had been stopped in the middle of the street, disturbing the traffic, so she soon started driving again.

"You can trust me" Jack said with all honesty in his heart.

He didn't know why he was pushing her so hard, he just felt like she needed his help and he really wanted to help her, by some reason he felt impelled to. But she didn't want to let him get into this, it was all so new for her, she felt ashamed and didn't want to share with anyone else.

"Ok Jack, I was fighting a red dragon, I ran away from him but them I slipped and hit my head on a rock. When I woke up I realized that I had really hit my head but it was on my nightstand. There, satisfied?"

"A red dragon, huh?" Jack didn't believe a word of what she said. He just wished she could open up with him, but then again, he never did when he was in the same situation. Maybe he should take a new approach to that.

"We're here" As soon as she parked the car, she jumped off it. Jack's attitude was really confusing and bothering her.

"Hey! Had a nice trip?" Alexis asked smiling as soon as they met.

Erika gave her a small smile in response "Let's go in, I gotta use the bathroom" She passed through everybody and got in the place.

Alexis looked up at Jack, searching for an answer "What did you do?"

"Me?! Nothing!"

"She wouldn't turn like that out of the blue!"

"I just asked if it was her step father who gave her that cut"

"Damn Jack, don't ask her about her step father"

"Why?"

"Not of your business" Alexis quickly got in the place and raced into the bathroom to her friend.

Dan and Jack stood outside, staring at each other totally confused.

"Come on, let's wait inside" Dan finally said.

Erika was drying her face by the time Alexis came in.

"Hey, you ok?"

"Yeah. I am" Erika tossed the paper into the garbage and leaned her body against the wall.

"He did this, didn't he?"

Erika exhaled hard "First time. It wasn't that bad. It's just a cut and a bruise, no big deal"

"Ka, you gotta tell you mother this!"

"You think I haven't tried?! She's totally blind! He knocked her down with pills so he could show me his lesson and she still stands up for him!" A tear fell from Erika's eye, but she soon ripped it away. "I'm fine. Can we **please** not talk about this again?"

Alexis got closer to her friend and hugged her tightly "Sure. Come on, let's get something to drink"

After, by coincidence, meeting his two band mates at the Falcon, Charlie decided to get himself a drink. He was in the line when he spotted two girls standing not too far from him, both beautiful, but the one using a dark green jacket caught his eye. Just then, Jack joined him on the line.

"Slap me"

"What?" Jack frowned his eyebrows

"Slap me!"

Still confused, Jack did what his friend asked and slapped him on the back of his head. After a laugh Charlie looked over to the girl quickly and turned to Jack.

"It's still there. I'm in love!"

It was Jack's turn to laugh "Who's the lucky girl then?"

"Alright, I'll show you. But before that, you gotta remember our pact, right?"

"What?"

"The one I get first dibs on the next new girl I found"

"Oh, that"

"Take a look on what makes certain schools worth going"

Jack's eyes grew a bit, Charlie had just checked on Erika. He couldn't disagree with his band mate, on the right girl, those school uniforms were a free ticket to a trip in a front row sit of any guy's naughty imagination, and Erika just happened to be one of those girls. He couldn't deny it, he did checked on her and liked what he saw. But Jack scared himself while thinking that this 'checking' resulted in finding more than a nice ass on her, he sort of… cared about her? Damn. Jack didn't even notice that Charlie was already getting the drinks while he just stood there.

"Hi" Erika approached

"Hi" Jack barely smiled

"I'm sorry about… the attitude"

"It's ok" He glanced at her

"What's up? You might look a bit pleasant by seeing me. After all, you followed me to my car, remember?" She smiled playfully

"Well, I follow a lot of people to their cars" Jack said before getting away from her.

"What the hell is his problem?!" Erika frowned and asked out loud to herself

"Jack? Oh, he's alright. He's just moody" Charlie said after getting near Erika

"You know him?"

"Oh you know, we're band mates. But if you ask me, he got an attitude problem"

"So it shows"

"Here, want one?" Charlie offered her a Coke.

"Yeah thanks" She took the can from his hand. After that, Charlie leaded them to a table, where they could talk. None of them saw Jack glaring at this.

After half an hour talking, well, actually Erika had merely said her name and age, because Charlie couldn't just shut up and from time to time she'd look over where Jack, Dan and Alexis were sat.

She looked over her watch, Dracon would be home in fifteen minutes.

"I don't mean to be impolite, but I really gotta go. Bye!" She quickly got up scared of what might happen if he ever suspected that she went out after school.

"Bye!" Charlie half yelled while raising his hand.

"Alex, you mind going with Dan? I must go home now" Erika said in one breath as she reached their table.

"No problem. You alright?"

"Yeah. Bye guys!" She rushed off to her car.

Jack's stare kept on the door where the girl had just passed through. Again, something was up, he could do nothing and just to make things even better, Charlie decided to be attracted by her. But he actually shouldn't mind about it… too late.

"Erika, where have you been?!" Loren asked worriedly, she had also realized what time it was.

"If he asks, I was here the whole time Lo. I'm gonna take a shower, tell him it's because I was working on a school project and got all dirty with paint!"

"Alright, go!"

Erika placed the video camera on her nightstand along with her bag on the floor and rushed inside her bathroom. After half an hour, she went out and headed to the living room, assuming that her mother was there.

"Hi" She said in a low voice when she met Dracon sat on the couch "Where's my mom?"

"She is at friend's house" Erika's blood froze

"What about Loren?" Erika asked in the most casual way she could

"I sent her home earlier"

"Oh" She simply said before turning to go to her room.

"Wait" Erika swallowed hard before turning. "Did you happen to forget the little talk we had about not meeting the Mercers again?"

"No" She defiantly looked at his face

"No? Hmm… So you decided to meet him anyway?"

"Him? Who's him?" She played dumb. He couldn't know about what happened during the afternoon, there was no way he could have! "I don't know what you're talking about"

"I think you do" He inclined his body forward and took something from behind his back. Erika saw something a bit shiny and her heart skipped a beat as she thought it was a gun. But she was wrong, it was nothing more than her own video camera.

By the time Dracon got home, he walked in her room to see where she was, saw the camera on the nightstand and quickly turned it on to see what Erika had done with it. There was one single video, the one Alexis had made that afternoon, including the part Jack recorded inside Erika's car. She was screwed.

"You have no right to take my stuff! And that isn't from today!" She tried to argue

"Oh no?"

"No"

"Then why you have a cut on your eyebrow just like you have now?" Damn, she totally forgot about it.

"Coincidence?"

Dracon left the camera on the couch, quickly got up from it and walked towards Erika like a lion attacking a poor baby antelope. By reflex she tried to run away but it was too late, he grabbed her hair and sent her flying to the couch, at least it smoothed the fall. But he surely wasn't over yet.

"Don't play smart with me Erika!" He turned her body and pressed her head against the coffee table "You're going to lose"

"STOP!" She tried to get rid of him and kicked his left knee.

After a small groan, he lifted her up and slapped on her face "You shouldn't have done that"

She really shouldn't. He smacked her head on the wall two times, that was enough for her to get dizzy, lose her balance and fall on the ground with a painful groan. He kicked her stomach and this time she didn't fight to suppress the yell and left it out. He kneeled beside the girl and grabbed her jaw, squeezing it.

"I'll be nice to you just this last time. You're hitting my nerves and I'm losing patience. You do **not** get near of **any** Mercer, **ever** again! You got it?" Erika didn't answer, she couldn't move a muscle "YOU GOT IT?" He shook her head, making her to almost throw up.

"Yes" She weakly whispered.

"You better! Now go to your room!" As she didn't stand up, Dracon took her by her underarms and dragged her into the bedroom. There, he simply tossed her like if she was a dirty t-shirt and closed the door. He didn't see that her head hit the corner of the bed and she passed out on the floor.

"Jackie, is everything alright?" Evelyn asked to her youngest son after peaking into his room.

Jack arrived home and headed straight away to the bathroom after barely saying hi to his mother. He was totally disturbed and the fact that he didn't know why he was feeling like that, only made it worse. After taking a hot shower, he locked himself in his room.

"Yeah" He answered in a low voice, not looking to his mother, just at the ceiling.

Evelyn wasn't convinced at all, she walked in and sat by the edge of his bed before softly massaging his foot, which was warmed by a soft gray sock. Jack knew she meant that she was there for him, that he could feel confortable to talk about whatever he wanted to with her. He couldn't resist to the old lady's warm small smile.

"Have you ever made a promise to someone and then realized that you can't keep it?" He spoke in his usual deep voice.

Evelyn nodded softly "Yes"

"What you do?"

"You do your best"

"But… how?"

"Jackie, what promise you made?"

"I don't wanna talk about it Ma"

She took a deep breath "But you know you can, right?"

"Yeah. Thanks Ma"

"Hey Cracker Jack" Bobby walked in

"Not now Bobby. Do it some other time" Evelyn spoke softly

"Why?" He contested

"Do what?" Jack became curious

"Jackie's not alright now" She said to Bobby and then turned to Jack "You'll know later"

"I wanna know now!"

"Aww Fairy, your boyfriend dumped you, sweetie?"

"Fuck you!"

"Jack!"

"Sorry Ma! Just tell me what's up!"

Evelyn and Bobby eyed each other and then looked at Jack, who had already sat down, prepared to listen whatever his brother wanted to tell him.

"Alright Cracker Jack" Bobby took a deep breath "Erika needs help" Jack opened his mouth to speak but Bobby didn't give him a chance to "Maybe she doesn't know yet, but she does. Her step father, that motherfucker ain't that plain cute rich daddy's boy that everybody thinks he is… He was already married once"

"What happened? The woman realized he was an ass?"

"Yeah. But when she did, it was too late. He's violant, she threatned to leave him and he hit her… Hit her so bad and then choke her to death"

Jack's eyes grew "What?! How you know that?!"

Bobby scratched his chin "She was my girlfriend before marrying him. She told me what was going on, she'd live with me after leaving him"

"Holy shit!" Jack was totally shocked by that. "We gotta do something! For Erika and her mother!"

"I found out her mother's pregnant, he probably won't do a thing to her as long as she lows her head to him. I'm more worried about Erika, she needs to visit us and we gotta tell her"

"She already knows" Jack spoke in a low voice

"What?"

"I don't think it was too bad, but he already hit her and she's got some issues with him, that's clear for anyone to see. Bobby, we gotta take her outta there!" Jack suddenly became desperate.

"We can't take her out Jackie. She's underage, we're gonna end up going to jail by kidnapping her"

"YOU PREFER LETTING HER THERE TO DIE BY THAT FUCKER'S HANDS?!"

"Hey, calm down!" Bobby censured his loud tone

"Jackie, we'll do whatever we can to keep her safe" Evelyn tried to calm her young son down.

"While we're here talking, he may be already beating the shit out on her!"


	7. More than he knows

**Thanks Silver of Melody and Gabrielle for the reviews!!! Keep it coming!**

**Thanks also for adding this to the allerts folks! ;)**

**Enjoy...**

By the moment she opened her eyes, pain crashed into every inch of her body, her head was hurting the most. The sunshine was coming in by the window, it was already morning. She looked around, she had slept on the floor during the whole night.

Erika carefuly made her way to the bathroom and looked herself on the mirror. Tears started to fall from her different colored eyes, she had a new cut on her lower lip and a big scratch on her forehead, a purple circle on her stomach and as she touched her head, she felt the dry blood.

"Ka, are you ready for school?" Loren asked by her bedroom's door.

Erika squeezed her eyes shut "Almost"

She took a quick shower and dressed the school uniform, including its coat, she would come back straight home after classes. Erika put her fringe on the side, so it'd cover the scratch, that was the only thing she could do to hide last night's marks.

"Bye Lo" She said as she passed by the kitchen. Her mother and Dracon had already left for work.

"Erika wait!"

"I'm late" She said as she closed the front door and got into the elevator.

Driving to school wasn't much of a problem as she thought it'd be. Her body was still painful, but she could manage to pretend that everything was alright, like she had been doing for the past year.

"Miss Dellrance" Mrs. Grayhall called her as she stepped into the hall to go to class.

"Mrs. Grayhall, I'm sorry. I know I'm late but-"

"It's alright. Your father called to let us know you'd be late today"

"My father?"

"Yes, Mr. Winters"

"He's not my father" She always got pissed when people referred to Dracon as her father, even knowing he wasn't.

"Anyway, Mr. Johnson wants to see you"

"Why? I did nothing wrong"

"Just go, he's waiting for you"

Erika sighed and walked to the principal's office.

"Miss Dellrance, please sit down" She did as she was told "Are you feeling alright?" The principal asked concerned.

Erika frowned "Yes" She answered a bit unsure of what he meant

"When Mr.Winters called to tell us that you had fallen from the bike, I must admit that I got worried"

Of course Dragon already had a plan. "Well, thanks. But I'm fine"

"We talked for a bit. He said you hit your head pretty badly"

"Yes, but as I told you, I'm fine. I need to go, I'm late for class" She got up

"I just decided to dismiss you for today, don't worry"

"Why?" She sat back

"Mr. Winters also told me that you've been showing a strange behavior, I must admit that I was surprised by that. You're a good student and our school has a psychological program so-"

"Psychological program?!"

"So we would like you to take a few sections"

"What are you talking about?! I'm not crazy!"

"I know you're not Miss Dellrance. We just want to help you" He handed her a paper "You can call to this number and schedule the perfect time for you. We're glad to help and hope you feel well soon"

"Yeah, thanks. Can I go now?"

"Yes, you may go"

That was all so unbelievable! Dracon couldn't have done that, it was insane! He beated her and she was the crazy one?! Her head was spinning. She got into her car and started driving, she had no idea where she was heading to. Erika just noticed where she was when she stopped the car, she was in front of the Mercer house with her cheeks full on tears' trails.

It was extremely strange, she couldn't describe the safe feeling she had by just being around there. She looked at what was once her home, that had been such a great time. She was little, innocent and most of all, she was loved. She rested her elbows on the wheel and buried her face on her hands as she cried her heart out. Her life had turned into a mess from night to day, she felt lost and alone.

"Are you ok?" A male voice asked and she looked to see who it was, she had never seen him.

"Yes" She cleaned her throat and quickly wiped the tears with her hands "I am, thanks"

"You don't look ok" She gave him a small laugh, she obviously looked everything but ok. He looked into her teary red eyes. "Have we met before?"

She shook her head "I'm afraid we haven't"

"I'm Jeremiah" He extended his hand at her through the window and she shook it

"Erika"

"Are you lost?"

"I… just…no"

"Well, I'm gonna visit my mom" He pointed at Evelyn's house "Would you like to come in and have a glass of water?"

"Wait. Are you Jerry Mercer?"

He looked at her puzzled "Yes"

Erika smiled and got out of the car "I'm Erika Dellrance. I was your neighbor ten years ago" Jerry looked at her, trying to remember "Little Thunder?" She jerked her head to the side before a small laugh

"Oh man! I remember now!" He laughed "I knew I had seen those eyes before!"

Erika couldn't hel but smile "The advantages of having a rare condition"

"Yeah! Come in, come in! Ma will be thrilled to see you!"

"Actually, she already has"

"What?"

"Bobby and Jack too"

"Damn, I also miss those things! At least I'm ahead of Angel! Come in"

She was uncertain if she should come in "I- I don't-"

"Aw come on!" He cut her off and pushed her inside the house. Jerry pretended to not notice that she flinched as he touched her shoulders "Ma!"

"Jerry?"

"Look who I found!" He said with a huge smile to his mother

"Erika, dear!" Evelyn but her into a hug, which Erika contributed. Maybe she squeezed Evelyn too much, but she had to feel her, she had to feel a mother figure. "Shouldn't you be at school?"

"I hmm… I overslept and lost track of time"

"Oh, don't let that happen again missy!" Evelyn knew she was lying, Erika had her school uniform on.

She smiled "Won't do"

"Where have you been?" Jerry asked Erika and she filled he in. "Whoa, it's been a long time. Wait, what's your step father's name again?"

"Dracon Winters"

He took a moment to think "Ma, isn't that-"

"Jerry, can you wake Jack up please?" Evelyn cut him off to prevent him from speaking what he was about to.

"Yeah, sure"

"I'm sorry Eve for coming here that early. I mean, I actually wasn't going to come here but-"

"There's no need to explain yourself, sweetie" Evelyn cut her off with a sweet smile "You're welcome anytime"

"Thank you" Erika answered with a warm smile.

"Hey!" Jack exclaimed by the stairs. He was still putting his t-shirt on, that meant Erika had a good opportunity to give his abs a detailed look. Her jaw fell slightly open, Evelyn saw that and tried to hide a smile. Erika shook her head a bit and recomposed herself.

"Hi!" She waved.

Jack reached where Evelyn and her were standing and, in an unexpected move, hugged the girl. Erika was a lost of action, she put her unsteady hands up, she really didn't know what to do with them so she just placed them on each of his arms while they squeezed her lightly, pulling her body closer to his. When he was done with his surprising act, he held her shoulders, amazingly enough, he didn't touch the sore spots, and bent a little to look into her eyes

"Are you alright?"

She laughed nervously "What you talking about? I'm- I'm great!"

Jack got back to his normal height "You're a bad liar" Jerry had told him she was crying outside.

"No I'm not! I'm bad in telling the truth" She was the only one who laughed at that

"Where's Bobby?" Jack asked to Evelyn

"I don't know Jackie"

"Damn…"

"You can do it yourself" Evelyn gave her son an assuring look.

"Do what?" Erika asked curious

"Have you already had breakfast?" Jack asked

"No, I'm not really hungry"

"But I am. Care to lend me your keys?"

Erika looked unsurely at Evelyn and she gave her an assuring smile. She took them from her coat's pocked and placed on his open hand.

"Come on" He said with a smile before putting his black leather jacket on.

"Alright, alright! Bye Eve, bye Jerry, it was nice to see you!"

"You too kiddo, go on!" Jerry laughed "He likes her, doesn't he?" He asked to his mother with a smile as Jack closed the door.

Evelyn smiled "More than he knows"

"What the hell that came from?" Erika asked while Jack was driving.

"What?"

"What you mean what? The hug! Yesterday at the Falcon you barely looked at my face and the next day you hug me?"

Damn. She reminded him of the promise he had done to Charlie and by looking at her, he reminded himself that he couldn't keep it.

"I was just glad to know you're alright"

"You really are disturbed, aren't you?"

He laughed "Maybe"

He parked the car near a bakery and leaded them inside. It was a small place, but it smelled delicious.

"So, what you want?" Erika opened her mouth but Jack didn't let her to speak "Don't come with the 'I'm not hungry' bullshit"

She sighed "Ham and cheese croissant and orange juice"

"Pancakes and Coke for me. All to go, please" He said to the attendent girl, who gave him a high five look.

"Coke at this time?"

"Oh, excuse me if I'm not a healthy rich ass who eats ham and cheese croissant and drinks fresh orange juice every morning"

She slapped on his arm "You're such a jackass"

Jack laughed. Erika started looking through the magazines they had to sell there. While she randomly went through the pages, Jack took the moment to study her, he couldn't believe someone would have the guts to hit her. She was just a beautiful girl, nothing more than a kid, how could anyone be so dirty to that point? How could her mother not see what was happening? He really wanted to help her.

"Sir!" The attendent half yelled and Jack almost jumped "Here it is" She handled him the package with the food and the drinks with a smile.

"Ah, thanks" Jack payed everything and leaded them back to the car.

"How cute, Jack Mercer buying me breakfast!" Erika said with an ironic sweet smile

"Don't worry, you can pay me back latter"

She laughed "Where are we going?"

"You'll see"

"Mistery doesn't go with you Jack"

"But sexiness does"

She cracked a laugh "Cocky there, aren't we?"

"I'd go with sincere"

"That's only you sayin'"

They laughed together before Jack finally decided to put some music on.

"Care to explain why, exactly, we are here?" Erika asked after swallowing her final piece of croissant and before sucking her orange juice.

Jack and her were sat on the hood of her car, in front of a frozen lake, while eating their breakfast.

"Damn, you're not easy to please, are you?"

She chuckled "Oh, so you're tying to please me Cracker Jack?"

"I noticed you changed your hairdo"

"Just the fringe… Nice way to avoid the question by the way"

"Why?"

"Why what? You got any chocolate there?"

"Why you changed it? And no, no chocolate"

"Cause I wanted to"

"Yeah?"

She was getting pissed at this "What you mean by all that Jack?" She asked seriously, looking into his eyes with no smile on her face.

"I want you to trust me"

Erika took a deep breath "You're weird! First the hug, now the trust! What you really want?" She got off the hood.

He followed her move "I wanna help you!"

"I don't need your help! Everything's fine! So **stop** trying to be Superman, there's no one here to be saved!" She started to walk away but he held her by her waist, exactly where the bruise was, she moaned in pain before pushing him away in an impulsive act.

"I can see how fine you are"

"What the fuck is your problem Jack?!"

"Can't you just **stop** denying that your step father beats you and listen what I have to tell you?!" She didn't answer, if she opened her mouth to say anything, tears would come out from her eyes and she refused to cry in front of anybody. "It's more serious than you can possibly imagine! He killed his ex wife! He beated her and choked her to death! You're around a murderer and you **do** need help! My brothers, Ma and I are here to help you, but you gotta let us in!"

Erika sat on the snow covered ground with a disbelief look on her face. She couldn't believe his words. Yes, Dracon was a jerk, but a killer?!

"You can't fight him by yourself" Jack kept talking "We'll figure out some way to get you out of there! But you need to know who you're living with"

"That makes me feel so much better" She sarcastically said without facing him

"That's just for you watch out while we can't take you from there!"

"Then don't look for me anymore"

"What?" He asked confused.

"I'm forbitten to get near of the Mercers, any of you! That's why I got this" She finally lifted her fringe up so he could she the ugly scratch. He had already seen the split lip, and had an idea of the ugly bruise on her belly, she didn't have to show him.

Jack felt guilty. But how could he have known?! He kneeled beside her.

"That's cause his ex-wife was Bobby's ex-girlfriend. She'd leave Dracon to live back with Bobby, he found out about it and did the dirty service himself. That's why he doesn't want you near us, he's afraid you'd find out"

"Fuck…" She buried her face on her hands "What my mom got us into?" She asked to herself in out loud.

"Your mom's pregnant… he won't do anything to her. We're concerned about you. You gotta tell your father"

"My father's in Germany"

"So what!? Call him, send an email whatever! But you **gotta** tell him!" Jack only grew more and more protective towards her.

"I know…" Erika was breathing hard. A light breeze played with their hair and she closed her eyes, hoping that at the moment she'd open them, she'd wake up from this nightmare. That didn't happen, she was still there on the same spot. She gave Jack, who was staring at her, a small smile "Thanks"

He smiled back before carefully pulling her into a hug. Maybe he really liked her…


	8. Crashed Lips

**Thank you Silver of Melody for the review, and the ones who have added this to the alert! Keep it coming, please!**

**Have fun...**

"Now, why ain't you at your rich ass school?" Jack asked Erika while they were both sat back on the hood. He had just litted a cigarrett.

"I know what you're thinking" She grinned

"What?"

"I'm not skipping it. I actually got dismissed by the principal"

He laughed "What did you do?"

"I put a bomb in his office" She casually shrugged

"You kidding!"

"Yes" Erika laughed "Aparently I've beeing showing off a strange behavior"

"Isn't that like, normal for you?"

"Ha!" She slapped him "He also suggested me to take a freaking phsycollogical program" Jack laughed "It's not funny, damn Dracon is making me to look crazy on the eyes of other people"

"He talked to your principal?"

"Yeah. That means that now I'm the crazy bastard daughter, if I decide to go out there and tell them what he's doing, they won't believe me. After all, I'm disturbed"

"**That** man is fucking disturbed"

Erika snatched the cigarrett from his hand and took a drag of it. Jack was stunned by that and stared at her when she motioned to return the cancer stick.

"Oh please. Save your surprise to something else, you're not the only one has a bad habbit"

"So it shows" He took it back.

"I liked this place. It's peaceful" She stated and Jack only nodded at that before his cell phone started ringing.

"Yeah" He flipped it open

"Hey man, it's Charlie"

Jack glanced at Erika and then quickly turned his head to the other way "Hey. What's up?"

"So, I know that you saw Erika first, are you ok with me seeing her?"

"Seeing her?" Jack bolted from the hood and started walking around. Erika didn't really care, she simply lied on there, feeling the light breeze.

"Yeah, you know…"

"Yeah man" Why the fuck did he say that? He wasn't! "I meant what I said" Fuck no! He didn't! "But-"

"Great!" Charlie cut him off "Can you set her up for me man? I mean, I have no idea where to take her out"

"She's not like that dude… I can't set her up for you. Make **your **own moves, just don't rush over. Be careful"

"What the fuck Jackie-O? You're the one who says I'm too slow and now you tell me to not rush?!"

"Just sayin'…"

"Alright man, whatever! See ya"

"Yeah" Jack answered quickly before hunging up and exhaling hard. Charlie was such a pain in the ass! Damn. He had to help Erika to get away from her step father, there was no time to be emotionally involved with her… emotionally involved? Such a pussy thing! Right? Damn, he had to foccus on something else. "What you doing? Jack asked as he got near the car, Erika was inside of it, apparently waiting for him.

"Come on" She montioned with her head for him to get in. He did what he was told without questioning where they were going.

"Ain't you gonna ask who I was on the phone with?" Jack asked halfway to wherever Erika was driving them.

"Ain't you gonna ask where I'm taking you to?" He simply shrugged, she did the same move "I figured that if you wanted me to know, you'd have told me. Besides, it's not of my business" She said after a little while.

Jack nodded "It was Charlie"

She frowned "Charlie…? Ah! Your friend?"

"Yeah" Jack couldn't help but chuckle "I see he made quite an impression at you" She could barely remember his name.

Erika laughed. Charlie surely hadn't made as good impression as Jack. "I was distracted when we were talking" She mentioned without looking at him.

"Why's that?"

"Ah, we're here!" Erika giggled happily as she stopped the car.

"Fuck, you brought me to carry your bags?!" He asked with raised eyebrows as he realized they were in a mall parking lot.

"No asshole. Come on" Both jumped off the car and walked in.

"Die! Die!" Erika yelled as she shot the monsters coming towards her. Jack laughed amused.

They were at the mall's arcade, shooting intergalatical monsters after they finished snowboarding. Erika won that, because on Jack's turn, a kid disturbed him under Erika's secret command and in exchange, she gave the little boy a ticket to play basketball.

"Behind you!" Jack yelled just before he shot the monster who was 'chasing' Erika.

"Thanks"

He shrugged "You'd have done the same…" Erika smirked at him "Right?"

She laughed and shook her head "Yeah"

"Fuck! I'm dead!" Jack exclaimed as a monster ripped his head off. The same happened to Erika right after.

"Damn, me too… So, what's next?" She asked as both clipped they guns back where they belonged

"How many tickest we have left?"

"Four. We can do two things together or four separated…"

"Two together. My turn to pick" Jack quickly said as he started leading them to somewhere, Erika followed without objection. That was until when she saw where they were head to: the Guitar Hero game.

"Oh no! No, no, no!"

"What?! It's my turn to pick the game after all"

"Not a guitar one! That's unfair!"

He smirked "Deal with it"

"Asshole" She bitched loud enough for only him to hear.

Jack got 99 by the end, against Erika's 76. She actually did better than both expected her to. Sometimes she'd just glance at him, he was smiling while playing, he looked like a little boy having the time of his life. He moved his body slightly back and forth with the song's beat while he muttered the lyrics. Erika felt like if she could watch him doing that the whole day. Once her lapses where over, she'd concentrate back on the game, hoping he didn't see her staring at him. But then again, she didn't see him doing the same back when they were killing monsters.

Now it was Jack's turn to complain when he found himself in front of the dance game.

"You had that coming" She warned him with a chuckle.

Erika actually wasn't coordinated enough to do that good, but she was sure Jack would do worse and was willing to humiliate herself to see him trying to keep up with the colored steps, that'd be hilarious. And indeed it was, he was always late and ended up cursing the game like if it was a person. He got 38 while Erika got 83.

"That was fucking embarrassing" Jack stood in front of Erika while she rested her body against a wall corner.

"Aaw why? You looked so cute dancing" She chuckled

"Shut up"

"So, what we do now?" He asked casually, he really didn't feel like going home and watch crappy TV.

"Fuck!"

"What?" He frowned with a smirk. That wouldn't be a bad idea, he just didn't expect her to be so open about it.

"No, jerk! Nate's here" Erika was cautiously looking over Jack's shoulder.

"Who the hell is Nate?"

She signed "We have English classes together and his father is friends with Dracon. Damn, I forgot today classes usually end earlier"

"So?"

"So? Jack, if he sees us together, he's gonna tell his father and right after, we know what will happen"

"But he doesn't know who I am"

"Coming from Nate, he won't care if it's really you or not"

"Then let's-"

"Damn!" Erika cut him off "He's coming!" She looked around quickly, they were pretty much trapped. They were in a corner and Nate was probably heading to the bike game not too far from where they were. Erika grabbed Jack's jacket and quickly pulled him closer to her, crashing her lips against his.

Jack was totally taken aback by that, but he'd enjoy anyway. Their lips were only locked, she didn't seem to want to allow him to do something else and he didn't want to have her freaking out over him in front of everybody, so he was content at this merely contact. He was sure she could do a lot better though. Jack looked down at her, without moving his face away from hers, her eyes were also open, but they were staring at where he assumed the guy was. For a moment he wished she'd dedicate some of her attention to what was going on right there and not to the danger of beeing saw with him. She was still holding a grip of his jacket with both hands.

Jack was taller and heavilier build than Erika, that meant there wasn't much left of her to see. That was probably the best idea she had ever had. Nate was still there with two more friends and as time went by, this was getting rather uncomfortable. She pulled away from him, but not too much.

"They gone?" Jack started to turn but she grabbed his jacket again

"No!" Erika cleaned her throat, she had sounded too desperate "Not yet. He's there with two other friends" She said in a much calmer tone.

"Alright" He nodded and looked down at her.

Now what? Damn, why every impulsive action had on its trail an awkward moment afterwards? That was exactly what was going on now. Erika wasn't ashamed of what she had done, but Jack's stare was disturbing. Even though she thought he already knew why she did that harmless act, she felt like she should apologize or something.

"Look…" She looked up at him and met his eyes "I'm sorry fo-" Jack didn't let her to finish as this time, he crashed his lips against hers. Now it was what you could call a descent kiss. At first it was a bit shy but as both recognized that they really wanted to keep it, the kiss became passionate and hungrier as every move went by. With his hands around her waist, Jack tightened his hold around her. Erika's right hand was on the back of his head, playing with his hair, while the left one still had a grip on his jacket as if this wouldn't let him go away from her. After a long while, they finally pulled away, Erika started laughing.

"What?" Jack asked confused

She shook her head "Nothing" and smiled at him.

"You teased"

"Not my problem your lack of self control. Plus, I did that to hide myself"

"Alright then" He shrugged "I take what I did back"

Erika crossed her arms in front of her chest "And how are you ever gonna take this back?"

"Like this" He smirked before kissing her again in almost the very same way he had before, expect that this time, they skipped the shy part.

Erika shook her head when they broke apart "**You** are disturbed"

"Maybe…" Jack smirked.

She looked over his shoulder, Nate was nowhere to be seen.

"Let's get outta here. I gotta pee!"

Jack stood in front of a random store, waiting for Erika to get out of the bathroom. He couldn't help but have a slight smirk on his face, just like a loser, but he didn't feel like such, not at all. He couldn't forget what he had to do because of those kisses back there, he had to get out of her house. And maybe that meant having her father taking her away.

"Yo Jackie boy!" A voice disturbed his thoughts and he looked to where it had came from. It was Charlie. Damn!

"Hey"

"What ya doin' here?"

"You know, just passing by" Jack lied, not sure why. So what? He was with Erika now and Charlie would have to deal with it. But then again, they had been friends for a long while.

"Ha! Me too… nothing on TV, huh?"

"Yeah"

"So we sh-"

"Hey!" Erika cut Charlie off. Jack watched his face iluminate by the sight of the girl near them.

"Erika! What a great surprise!"

"Surprise?" She looked up at Jack, who simply nodded at her. She gave Charlie a small smile. "Yeah. What you guys doing here?"

Jack opened his mouth to fake some answer but Charlie didn't let him to "Just hanging, you know. Maybe we could do it together?" He smirked.

Jack took a deep breath. Damn, Charlie was hitting on Erika right in front of his face and he didn't have the guts to say a word. And why? Why did he care so damn much? Luckily, Erika didn't depend on him to make her excuses.

"I'd love to, but I'm already on my way out"

"Maybe you can give me a ride?" Jack tried to hide a smile. That'd be the perfect excuse to get out of there with her.

"Sure" She casually answered.

"Oh, I won't pass that! I live near Jack, you can drop me there"

Erika nodded in agreement while mentally cursing him. Charlie was such a pain in the ass!

Charlie couldn't shut himself up, boring both Erika and Jack with his useless talk. The girl found a way to shut him up by turning on the radio. Jack was extremely grateful by that. The sucker had already made him to sit on the back seat by himself, listening to his voice non stop was too much for his patience to handle.

"Hello Erika"

"Hi Lilly" Erika answered to her mother's friend who was about to have dinner with them. Everything was under control, Dracon didn't seem to suspect of anything. Erika had came home on the right time and had enough time to make sure every trace of her afternoon was well hiden from the dragon's eyes.

"Do you think your little brother or sister will be born with the same eyes as you?"

"The same weird ones?" Dracon laughed and annoying Lilly joined him. As Erika kept shut, Dracon bothered her "Answer Lilly's question Erika"

"No, I don't think so"

"Of course he or she won't Lilly! It's my baby! It's gonna be a healthy and **normal **baby" He said with an evil smile and Lilly laughed at his statement. Helen walked in the room, that only motivated him to keep going. "Our son will be the closest of perfection possible. Smart and beautiful. That means, all that Erika isn't" The adults laughed at this hurting coment, Erika just looked down at her red ballet flats.

"I'll help Loren to serve" She said in a low voice as she got up from the couch.

"Stay where you are" Dracon cold voice said and she turned. He turned to Lilly "Now you know what I mean, don't you? Helping the maid to serve… what an absurd! Tell me Erika, the principal Johnson talked to you today, didn't he?"

"Yes"

"Sit down Erika" He comanded as the girl still stood, with no argument, she did what he said. "I'll make sure you follow the program myself. Don't worry sweetie, you'll be fine soon. It all depends on **you**" Only Erika noticed the irony and duble sense on this, she merely nodded. Erika never thought she could hate someone like she did him.

In the middle of the dinner, Erika got up from the chair and went to the kitchen, to grab another soda. As she closed the refrigerator's door, her look met Dracon's stare.

"What are you doing?"

"Just grabbing another soda" She showed him the can on her hand.

"You disgust me" He stated before, out of the blue, pushing her hard. Since she wasn't waiting for that at all, her body moved backwards and she ended up falling on her butt, carrying along one chair. Helen, Lilly and Loren came to the kitchen quickly, all scared by the loud noise.

"What happened?" Helen sounded horried but Erika knew better. She knew Dracon would make up a crappy excuse, blaming her for all the mess, and her mother would buy it without a second blink.

"Erika fell. I tried to catch her, but there wasn't time" He extended his hand to the girl, who simply ignored it and helped herself up before pulling up the chair on its place, ignoring the pain on her lower back.

"Aaww Dracon, it's so sweet to know how much you look after her" Lilly said with a white smile. Erika swore she must have been on drugs or something.

"I try my best. It's a pity she doesn't recognize it" And now he plays innocent!

"Erika, honey, you must thank Dracon"

"For what?" She frowned. Her mother was surely another junkie.

"For trying to help you!"

"It's ok, baby. She doesn't recognize what I do to her anyway, it's ok" Dracon walked out with his head down.

"Jesus Erika! Why can't you be nice for a change?!" Her mother complained before following her monster husband.

Lilly shook her head "You really need help" and walked away as well.

Loren stood by the door way, just looking at the poor girl. She really needed help, to walk out of there. She didn't make any attempt to reach for the teen, she'd flinch away and say she didn't need help anyway.

Erika gave Loren a half smile before walking to her room. She couldn't stand this anymore. Hours later, she walked around the apartment to make sure everyone was asleep, clear. She turned her laptop on and send her father a desperate email, he had to get her out of there, he was her last hope. Erika just hoped he would do it before it was too late.


End file.
